Transgender man has private audience with Pope Francis [Link]

A transgender man from Spain had a private audience with Pope Francis at the Vatican on Saturday.

Hoy, a newspaper in the Extremadura region of Spain, reported that Diego Neria Lejárraga and his fiancée had a private audience with the pontiff that took place at his official residence.

Neria told Francis in a letter that some of his fellow parishioners at the church he attends in the Spanish city of Plasencia rejected him after he underwent sex-reassignment surgery. He said a priest even called him “the devil’s daughter.”

Francis called Neria on Christmas Eve after receiving his letter.

The private audience took place a month later.

“After hearing him on many occasions, I felt that he would listen to me,” Neria told Hoy in an interview the newspaper published on Sunday.